During the past year, many of us cooked more meals at home, learned to cook for the first time or became more adventurous in the kitchen with more time on our hands.
As we found out, it’s easy to become bored with the usual home menu rotation and crave something new. And how long ago was it we promised ourselves to eat healthier in the New Year after a year of comfort food indulgences?
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Simply Seedlings, an indoor microgreens growing operation, sells microgreens to area restaurants and directly to consumers.
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As spring approaches, farmers markets will soon be getting into full swing, and two local farming operations — one urban and one rural — have some unusual produce offerings you might want to try that can help add variety to meals and help with healthier eating.
Ryan Sipes and Raelyn Nickerson
Ryan Sipes is owner of Simply Seedlings, an indoor microgreens growing operation he started in a spare bedroom in downtown Lexington in May 2019, along with his girlfriend, Raelyn Nickerson. It’s licensed as a food growing facility, with industrial shelving, mounted lights and rows of verdant, sprouting microgreens.
Sipes sells directly to consumers who contact him via text, phone or social media and to local restaurants, including Minton’s, Corto Lima, ItalX and Ranada’s Kitchen.
“Growing up, all of my grandparents, pretty much, were doing some type of agriculture, whether commercial or for their own consumption,” Sipes said.
While a student at Transylvania University, Sipes interned at Food Chain, a Lexington nonprofit that works to demonstrate and educate about sustainable food systems. He became interested in microgreens and decided to try his hand at growing not only common ones like sunflower, pea, broccoli and radish shoots but also less-common varieties like micro-sized basil, cilantro, parsley, arugula, chervil and dill.
He said the microgreens are easy to throw into salads, wraps or even into smoothies for tastiness and “anytime you just want a nice pop of color.”
Grown year-round, the microgreens are sold in half ounce to ounce containers and cost between $3 and $7. Some customers like to mix and match varieties in their orders, he said.
Pre-COVID 19, Sipes got started by showing up at restaurants with samples of his microgreens and making a personal introduction. Now he makes scheduled visits to prospective new clients.
Chefs often share photos of their signature dishes artfully adorned with the microgreens, and Sipes said Nickerson is also a great cook/baker who photographs her own dishes with microgreen accoutrements for social media posts that help promote Simply Seedlings’ harvests.
Sipes is working to streamline the ordering process and participate in local farmers markets this year. Currently, Simply Seedlings offers free delivery on Tuesdays and Fridays. Once the pandemic wanes, he hopes to move operations to a stand-alone facility.
Maggie Dungan
At Salad Days Farm in Versailles, Kentucky, Maggie and Jarrod Dungan grow a variety of certified organic produce for sale in the farm’s store on Craig’s Creek Road, as well as at the Franklin Farmers Market, Lexington Farmers Market downtown on Sundays, and in season April through October at the Southland Drive market.
The farm yielded 28,151 pounds of produce last year, Maggie Dungan said. While the farm produces year-round, the warmer months are busiest, she said.
The farm launched in 2015, after Dungan was studying to be a holistic nutritionist and became interested in eating healthy, locally-produced food. That journey led her and Jarrod, who grew up in a farming family, to move from Paris, Kentucky, to Versailles to start a fledgling farming operation.
“I’m very much a do-it-yourself type of person and I wanted to grow my own food,” she said.
While the farm grows traditional produce, some unusual offerings pique customers’ interest, such as black and watermelon radishes and dried green tomatoes.
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Maggie and Jarrod Dungan grow a variety of certified organic produce on the farm, which they founded in 2015.
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“It certainly brings [people] over, and they ask about it and they may buy something else that they’re more familiar with” even if they don’t yet venture into trying exotic-looking produce, Dungan said.
She said people also like to show o. dishes made with the ingredients she sells on social media, including colorful hot peppers, pea shoots, microgreens, pickled okra and cucumbers and homemade jams.
While she’s no stranger to growing multicolored carrots, white eggplants and purple bell peppers, Dungan has to make a judgment call based on how much these varieties will yield compared to traditional types, and how well they’ll likely sell, before deciding on what to plant. She is, however, toying with the idea of growing purple and orange cauliflower.
As Dungan gets requests for unusual vegetables to grow or pickling projects to try, “I certainly take it into account, but some things are just harder than others and not worth the time,” she said.
When asked for her take on people’s attraction to out-of-the-ordinary produce, she said people become bored of buying the same fruits and vegetables and like trying new things.
And with the help of the internet, they won’t be at a loss for what to do with them once they get home.
“It’s a lot easier these days to find out about different produce and how to use it,” she said. Especially when it comes to adding some variety to meal plans this spring.